Independent film distributors recognised

Independent movie distributors have been given official recognition on the Gold Coast.

The Australian Independent Distributors Association held its award ceremony last night as part of the Australian International Movie Convention.

Convention spokesman Ian Sutherland says independents play an important role in the industry.

"These days there's probably a blurred line, now I think a lot of the majors like to think that they have independent movies, the independents are the ones that still carry the films that we all love going to see," he said.

"They probably don't have the same box office citing of a Transformers or a Batman or something like that but they certainly are worthy Academy Award type films that are often foreign language films as well but made on smaller budgets."